29 Mar 2006: VOR Approaches

Got a late start tonight...but oh, what a night! Clear skies, beautiful sunset and finally.....spring weather. Deprted Bedford after 6 p.m. on runway 5 and climbed directly to Lawrence VOR to shoot the VOR approach into Lawrence. Good intercept, good procedure turn to reverse course and good VOR alignment. But just busted the MDA before the MAP. Executed a missed approach and headed north to buy some time and then headed to the VOR approach into Beverly. Same thing again, just busted the MDA. Lesson learned? Start level off about 50 feet above the MDA and stablize the altitude. Other than that, it was pretty good.

Flew the visual back to Bedford. At night, Hanscom field is all but invisible. Could barely see the threshold lights for runway 11 but made a nice square pattern and really greased the landing. I'm starting to get itchy for some real IFR approaches.....this weekend is shaping up for some pretty lousy weather.....maybe it won't be too lousy and I'll get in some real IFR hours!

22 Mar 2006: ILS Approaches

Weather took a turn for the worse tonight. Winds were gusting to 18, skies overcast at 4,000 feet and there was light snow painted on the radar. The temperature dropped just below freezing so pre-flight was pretty cold and dark. On the other hand, nobody was around so radio communications with Hanscom Tower were limited to "Taxi to runway 29" and "Cleared for Takeoff".....not too common an occurance at this busy strip.

Tonights special was to be a mix of approaches. The first was the ILS at Lawrence airport. Set-up was much easier than last time and 1700 rpm held about a 500 fpm descent and 90 knots airspeed. At decision height, the CFII called out missed approach and we were off in a climbing left turn to 2,000 feet. I needed more up pitch to keep at V(y) of 75 knots but other than that, it was a good approach. Boston cleared us right to Beverly and I barely had enough time to clip on the Runway 16 localizer approach, pre-brief and activate the KLN-94 GPS. This time throttle setting of 1500 rpm helped get a 700 fpm descent rate for the non-precision approach. Once again, this wasn't too bad and at the missed approach point I pitched up and to the left, heading for the hold at WITCH intersection. I had barely gotten a positive rate of climb established when Boston gave me vectors to Bedford.

I needed a little more time to set up so requested delaying vectors which were given. Finally, I shot the approach forrunway 29 at Bedford, west missed approach and came around again for another shot. It went well except the landing flare was late so the plane took a nice bounce on landing. Next time, I'll try a couple of stop and goes to get better acclimated to the flare height at night. All in all, a great time tonight!

18 Mar 2006: Localizer Approach

A cold day in the making, only 27 deg F and 16 knot wind on the flightline this morning. This was the first of some concentrated approach training. Took off behind a Citation X being careful to rotate early and stay upwind of his course to avoid wake turbulence. Then a climb to 2,000 and turn to the northeast to head in the general direction of the Lawrence VOR.

The first approach was the Runway 16 localizer approach at Beverly airport. I set up and activated the approach in the GPS, tuned all the receivers to the correct NAV and COM frequencies and obtained vectors to TAITS intersection, the final approach fix (FAF). About 3 miles before TAITS, I throttled back to 2,000 rpm and dropped 10 degrees of flaps to slow dow to 90 knots. At TAITS I decreased the throttle to 1700 rpm and started down to the MDA of 580' after starting the timer. Decision point was at 3 minutes and 24 seconds from TAITS. We reached it and executed the missed approach procedure, a climbing left turn to 2,000 feet via the 201 radial from the Pease VOR. Once reaching WITCH intersection, I entered the hold, just like practice a couple of weeks ago and started the hold. The GPS really makes this easy since WITCH automatically is loaded as the direct to point after the missed approach point is reached.

So after receiving vectors back to TAITS it was time for another go at it. There was a lot to remember, but it seemed a little easier this time. Beverly tower called our missed approach a little early due to traffic in the pattern so we turned north and requested vectors back to Bedford and were given the ILS runway 29 approach. The approach terminated at about 600 feet MSL and the landing was pretty smooth. After the last couple of weeks, the 16 knot gusts didn't seem very bad at all. Looking forward to giving it another go next Wednesday night.

By the way, here is my flight path on flight tracker, right from Boston Center radar !

12 Mar 2006: IFR Stagecheck 2 - Passed!

Today was the day for the second stagecheck. Got to Hanscom about 9:30 with rapidly changing weather. Wind was calm when I arrived, I preflighted with runway 29 active and by the time we were ready to taxi, ceiling was overcast at 5,000 feet and runway had switched to 23 with a 10 knot breeze. The examiner was great pointing out some new info such as IDing the departure runway localizer in case we needed to make an emergency landing right away. I rotated at 55 knots and my wheels hadn't even left the ground when he told me to put on my foggles. I did and he returned control of the plane to me for the climb out.

I had just completed my climb checklist when he failed the attitude indicator and HSI and told me to turn to 270 and climb to 3,500. I did using the magnetic compass with no problem, as soon as I reached 3,500 asked for a descent to 3,000 while coming to a heading of north. That worked out OK as well but just as I was leveling off at 3,000 he took control of the plane, told me to close my eyes and we started to roll around in an unusual attitude recovery exercise, still under partial panel.

When he told me to recover, the airspeed was increasing, rpm going high and the turn coordinator was pegged to the left........a decending spriral. Recovery was pretty smooth, power to idle, center ball and return coordinator to level, pitch up using the VSI and altimeter to ensure positive rate of climb while getting more throttle back in. He complimented me on the quick recovery but told me to proceed direct to GDM, the Gardner VOR and arcto the north at 10 miles.

At 10 miles I banked 90 degrees to the north, identified we were on the 100 radial and began the arc. Turbulence started to pick up. By the 070 radial it was hard to control attitude and by 050 radial, my head was banging off the cockpit roof. All the while wemaintained between 10.0 and 10.2 miles from the VOR.

Next he instructed me to "intercept and track the 040 radial and hold as published". I intercepted the 040 radial and began to track inbound slowing the plane to 90 knots which was early, but I thought it might smooth the ride a little. I explained that the entry would be paralles on the 298 radial and that turns were non-standard (to the left). Boy, this guy was throwing all kinds of stuff at me and cranking the radio volume up to be as distracting as possible.

I turned to 298 degrees at GDM and began my outbound track and started the 5 T's, turn the plane, start the timer, twist the OBS to the inbound course, throttle back to 90 knots and talk ("Cessna 221693 entering hold at 35 minutes past the hour"). What I didn't do was check the groundspeed on the GPS which was showing about 80 knots. So when I started the procedure turn, I was back over the VOR before the turn was completed.

OK. Set up for the next orbit, but as I passed over the VOR we hit some bad tuurbulence, not only vertical but horizontal as well. By he time the turn was complete, out groundspeed was 50 knots and I was holding a 45 degree crab to the left. The air smoothed out and I held the outbound heading for 2 minues and turned turned intercept the inbound radial. But even with a 90 degree interecept angle, the needle wouldn't come in and we passed over the VOR at 125 knots grounsdpeed and into heavy turbulence. I made another turn to the left this time holding 50 degrees of correction. Our groundspeed dropped to 40 knots andthis time the air smoothed out. Suddenly the HSI needle began to come in and shoot to the center so I took the wind correction out and the needle didn't move. After the left turn, I interecepted the inbound again but this time out groundspeed was 135 knots. Now we were drifting south ! I corrected for the drift and then we were back into the heavy turbulence and the needle started to move back the other way, we were drifting north and the groundspeed began decreasing as well.

I was shure I had flunked the holding portion of the test. After 20 minutes at GDM, the examiner finally said, "I can't for the life of me figure out where the winds are coming from, We must be flying right through a shear zone at the VOR." So he told me to proceed direct to Hanscom. The ride back was very rough and it was hard to hold course as we decended through the shifting winds. The extended base was fine as was the landing. While taxiing back, he told me I had done a fine job and he passed me. When I told him about my disappointment in not getting the hold set up perfectly he told me that he was more interested in the logic I used to work it out. Entry was good, corections were appropriate and most importantly, I keptto the protected side of the hold.

Whew! All of the work paid off. Now it's time to move up to some real fun....approaches.

11 Mar 2006: Cross Country to Sullivan County.

The weather today started out pretty lousy for my anticipated cross country flight to Burlington, Vermont. The ceilings were forlast broken to overcast at 3,000 feet opening up later in the morning to 4,500 broken with an AIRMET for moderate turbulance and mountain obscuration over the entire route of flight. The terrain rises to 4,000 feet in some places so my next thought was to file IFR. However, the temperatures were running 0 to -4 degrees C in places so icing was a distinct possibility. A Change of strategy was definitely needed so I called my dad in Liberty, New York and decided to head over there and pick up some seed potatoes he promised me. So we departed about 0815 hours from a pretty bust Hanscom field. Turbulence was horrible and we were held to 4,500 feet by an overcast layer. Josh started pulling together the paperwork to file IFR in the air when we say an opportunity to climb through a hole in the clouds above the layer. Up we went, eventually leveling off at 8,500 feet for a much smoother ride.

We headed southwest over Quabin reservoir and directly over Westover Air force base in Chicopee, MA. Just down the Connecticut rever valley you could see the city of Sprinfield and beyond it, Bradley Airport in Connectict.

The base used to house one of the Q areas the government used to house nuclear weapons for the bomb wing stationed there. That part of the base has long been deactivated.
Today it is the home of the 439th Airlift Wing who transport anything all over the globe. A gaggle of C5 Galaxy's were on the tarmac and I took the opportunity to get a telephoto shot of one of these monsters.
It's hard to gauge their size without some reference, but the Wright brother's original flight could have taken place inside of a C5.

The winds were pretty stiff from the west at about 40 knots so our grounspeed was pretty slow. After about an hour we were approaching Great Barrington, MA. To the west you could finally make out the Catskill Mountains and Hudson River in New York. In this photo, the Hudson is the near body of water and the Bridge is the Rhinecliff bridge between Rhinebeck and Kingston, NY. Beyond the river and Kingston is Ashokan Reservoir which supplied drinking water to New York City.

We crossed the Hudson river just south of the Rhinecliff bridge. This is a very high span which allows large tankers and container ships to move up the river as far north as Albany. On the west sdie of the bridge is Kingston-Ulster airport whose runway practically runs into the bridge roadway.

After crossing the river, we started the descent to Sullivan County International Airport. The view of Ashokan Reservoir and the CAtskill Preserve were great. It was a seprize to see open water on the reservior, it's normally frozen over this time of year.

I overflew the airport at 3,500 feet, turned and decended to 2,400 while entering the left downwing for runway 33. The landing was uneventful and we taxied to the ramp and shut down. Dad was there with his bag of potatoes, mission accomplished. We hung around long enough to grab some toast and coffee at the restaurant in the terminal building and then headed back. The cruise back at 7,500 feet showed us with a 145 knot grounspeed and we were back at Bedford in a little over an hour.

The views were really great today and I snapped a photo of the Connecticut river valley just north of Springfield. Besides the early turblence and a broken EGT gauge, it was a great flight.

3 Mar 2006: Holding at LOBBY

Last week it was flying in sunny, warm southern California. Today it was back to Hanscom field and balmy 18 degrees. Winds on the ground were 290 degrees at 18 knots gusting to 28. This was supposed to be a dress rehearsal for my 2nd stage check which is scheduled for next Sunday. I wasn't too thrilled about shooting holding patterns in this much turbulence and wind which was supposed to be from the north at close to 50 knots at 3,000 feet.

I was freezing by the time I completed preflighting the aircraft and called for pre-heat. Just as the pre-heating was complete, the office called and wanted to know if I could move to a different 172SP since the next renter needed short fuel on that one and they'd like me to burn off an hour or two of fuel. Being the wonderful person I am, I retied down the first aircraft and now froze through a second pre-flight.

My instructor Josh came out and apparently we were going to be the only ones up at the 7:30 hop; everyone else was canceling because of the wind. I figured if I could fly these patterns with this much wind, it would build my confidence for the actual stage check. So off we went.

This was a day of no waiting. We were #1 for takeoff from runway 29 and I was off the ground and climbing about 15 seconds down the runway due to he wind. The climb out was like a rollercoaster as I put on my foggles and leveled off at 3,000 feet. Josh gave me a holding clearance to hold northwest of DREEM intersection. I entered the ID into the Garmin GPS and proceeded direct to DREEM bouncing along rather nicely. I decided to climb and find some smoother air. The ride was much better at 3,500 so I leveled off, slowing to 90 knows about 4 minutes from the fix. The entry was a teardrop which required about 45 degrees of wind correction to stay on the protected side of the hold. With a groundspeed of about 55 knots (no kidding) I extended the outbound leg to 2 minutes and still wound up with a 45 second inbound leg. A second orbit worked out nicely and we were established in a good holding pattern , wind and all.

"Cessna 21693, proceed direct to LOBBY and hold as published. Expect further clearance at 1320," was the next thing I heard from the CFII's mouth. So LOBBY went into the computer and I turned the plane to the north. According to the enroute chart strapped to my leg, LOBBY is a non-standard hold meaning you make left turns instead of right. The entry was direct and no problem so we had a stable hold set up by the second orbit. Just as I was feeling pretty please with myself, Josh reached over to cover up the attitude indicator with a suction cup.

"OK. You've had an attitude indicator failure. turn to 240 and descend at 500 feet per minute to 3,000 feet." Great.....The turbulence started picking up again as we left 3,500 for 3,000. I leveled the plane off at 3,000 using the altimeter as primary reference with the vertical speed indicator supporting. So far so good.

"I've got the controls," Josh said. "Let's try some partial panel abnormal attitudes with at the attitude indicator covered up. Close your eyes and let me know if your starting to get sick. I sometimes get overly aggressive with these maneuvers." I closed my eyes and started to feel vertigo and he started to wheel the plane up and down, jinking to the left and right. The idea is to get your head spinning as if you lost your orientation in the clouds and had to recover the plane from an abnormal attitude. Just about the time I was starting to get queasy, he let go of the controls and said, "Recover!"

I opened my eyes and looked first at the airspeed indicator which was in the yellow arc and climbing. I immediately reduced throttle to idle. With no attitude indicator I couldn't see if we were level but a quick look at the HSI and turn coordinator showed a rapid turn to the left....A diving spiral! I rolled wings level so as to not overload the wings in my pullout and then pitched up the nose using the altimeter and VSI to establish I was back in straight and level flight. Once the airspeed settled down, I got some throttle back in and got the plane back under control. The whole thing was over in 5-10 seconds. We did a secondd one and Josh was satisfied that I could pass the stage check next week.

We headed back to Hanscom and we were #1 for landing on a short final. The wind shear was awesome! On final approach we lost 15 knots of airspeed about 200 feet above the runway so I added power and ate up more runway than usual. It all worked out. I guess I'm as ready for stagecheck #2 as I'll ever be....we'll see next Sunday.